


Dead to Rights

by yersifanel



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies)
Genre: Gen, He's a teenager, If they can reboot everyone I can reboot Remy, Post-Canon, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-09
Updated: 2017-02-09
Packaged: 2018-09-22 17:27:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9617831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yersifanel/pseuds/yersifanel
Summary: Erik Lehnsherr was no mentor, yet he finds himself saving the life of a young mutant in New Orleans, in more than ways than he thought himself capable of. Perhaps Charles was right, after all.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Because not even the X-Men themselves have any idea of what the heck is up with their timeline, this roughly takes place two years after X-Men: Apocalypse, so, the 80s.

One would've thought that after losing everything, there wouldn't be any care left in Erik to give, for anything or anyone. It was as such, for a while, but even if his grief, some light was able to found him, now he was once again wandering, but no longer completely lost. Perhaps just a bit, but not completely.

Erik tried to live a peaceful life, once, it didn't work out. Fighting was a constant in his life, survival being the need to fulfill. The fight had been just his own for a long while, then he joined other, separated from them, and slightly mended fences afterwards. It seem his life was a loop of run back and forward amongst being own his own and finding others to be around.

When he left Charles' school, he had no actual plan, but he needed to keep moving, find a reason to be for himself before trying to get closer to others. His steps carried him in unmarked directions, he just kept moving, looking ahead but with no real direction, for now.

\----------

The was a fain odor of copper in the air, even under the unforgiven rain washing everything with its frozen like touch, a strange temperature for the zone, for rain tended to be almost warm to the touch, tonight it seem it had other plans.

Erik extended his arm, palm up, watching the rain pool in it, standing in his place under a heavy tree, the swamp around him vibrating with the continuous sound of the fallen drops, loud and absolute, able to eat away any other sounds around him. Still, Erik remain still, his senses screaming at him to stay, to look, but he didn't even know what he was looking for or why.

"Useless," he said out loud, his voice clashing with the white noise of the falling rain. He gave a step, his mind tracing a route to leave, yet his chest constricted and every fiber of his being was silently screaming, begging for him to stay.

He closed his eyes, unable to comprehend what he was feeling, this urge to look, to find, strange and detached yet familiar, and so very loud.

Silence.

The urge was gone, it was just the sound of the rain and his own breathing, nothing more, nothing less.

He moved, quickly, forgetting about the rain, the uneven trails and the muddy water pools, he just moved, listen, calling for the magnetism, looking for something, anything, that would give him back that background noise that for a moment was louder than everything he had felt since Nina... since he lost them.

Minutes strained and then, he found something. Stretching his hand, calling his powers, a metal staff flew from underneath the mud, leaves and rain. Hard metal, tainted with blood but no rust, not a scrap then, but a Bo Staff.

Erik moved and in between the desolated swamp, found a body. For a moment there was nothing to feel, he had seen too many dead already, he did not fear them, but the body twitched, a young man, barely alive.

He turned the limp body around, resting the young man on his back, the mud covering a broken, bruised face, blood running freely from too many stabs to count, this man, no, this child was clinging to life with broken nails if at all. Erik found a pulse, faint, too faint, and forced one eye open, finding a red iris on black sclera.

"Mutant..."

He almost chuckle, of course it was a mutant, a mutant left to die.

Erik lifted the broken child into his arms, earning a soft, pained moan. Time was short, he was carrying and almost dead man, but if the world allowed him to stumble with this child, then perhaps the world would allowed him to save him.

\----------

Out of the swamp, and into the closest town. Erik moved like the some sort of specter, carrying a man barely out of his teens, bleeding into his clothes, not even strong enough to cry out anymore.

He was ready to fight the owner of the Clinic if necessary, instead he found a friendly hand in the doctor, a female human with no conflict in her heart for those like him, mutants.

"The worst is over," she announced after hours of working, peeling bloody gloves from her hands, "The rest is up to him."

He nodded, debating with the idea of leaving now, the young man was safe, or close to, yet the idea of leaving seem... wrong.

Sitting beside a bed never felt this painful, even if the metal frame and the teen lying there had no resemblance of what he once had, it was impossible for him not to make the connection, not to think of them, his girls, his lost world...

Erik closed his eyes.

\----------

On the third day of silence, Erik found red on black eyes staring at him from the bed.

"You're awake," he pointed out, expecting something out of the young man, who blinked at him.

"Oui," the younger man whispered, "Qui êtes-vous, monsieur?"

French... it had been a long while since he heard French, in his memory it always had the tone and accent of a woman, long gone from his life.

"A man—" he stopped, "A mutant, like you."

The younger man narrowed his eyes, looking at him oddly and Erik put off with his silent study, "Remy."

"Remy?"

"My name," he clarified, "Remy LeBeau."

For some reason, this made him smiled, "I'm Erik Lensher."

\----------

He's very young, Erik reflects. Young, bold and full of secrets already. The youngest son of a family living in shadows, adopted, but made one of them in everything but blood... and now their child is lost.

Erik has head the rumors, the prince of thieves has been murder they said, murder by the rival clan, taken in the name of justice, but the streets are aware that Assassins know no justice but their own, spilling the blood of a child to douse a fire.

Remy belongs to the Thieves Guild like the Thieves Guild belongs to him, perhaps Erik shouldn't be surprised that precisely because of that sense of belonging the young man almost got himself killed.

"You should have thought, at least once, that the so called prince of the Assassins would not play fair," his comment was sharp and it made Remy winced.

"By myself I could've beaten him," He young mutant said, shifting a coin between his fingers, "I was careless."

"And he has no honor."

Five against one, it was pure luck he survived.

Remy shrugged, the light in his eyes shining but his demeanor announcing his broken spirit. He made an offence against the Assassins Guild by getting closer to the daughter of their leader, then the brother showed up, and Remy.... Remy tried to fix his mistakes and instead faced betrayal.

"Bella was supposed to be different," he chuckled, "She sold me out."

"Are you surprised?"

"No," the young mutant answered, "Blood is thicker."

It was such a simple way to put it, yet for Erik it sounded more than that. Remy's family had his loyalty regardless of blood, such as Erik have given his to others because they have gained it.

He betrayed them, once. But no more.

"You were brave," he said to the confused teen, "Very stupid, but brave."

Remy looked at him in silence and chuckled, nodding in agreement, Erik found himself enjoying the moment.

\----------

Days became weeks, time passed and with it Remy regained his strength, although his silence was the solid barrier he used to hide. He didn't avoid Erik, nor refused to answer his questions, but there was a wall between them and Erik wondered how Charles managed to tear down those of his students with such ease.

"They're looking for you," Erik announced one afternoon, "Your family."

"They're looking for a body," Remy rebutted, keeping the sadness at bay. "It was my life for the safety of the Guild, father was against it, but I made the choice."

Erik glared at the young man, "You willingly walked towards your dead?"

Remy shocked his head, "I... I thought I could win, I would have if not for Bella's betrayal…."

The coin in Remy's hands glowed, his power pulsing yet week as his master was not complexly recuperated. The endless energy in him circulated, making his body heal faster than human yet slower than some other mutants. It also gave him an explosive touch that he made a weapon of, but was unable to give him a victory when it matter the most.

But the potential... Erik could see it, glowing in the palm of the ginger's hand.

He made the coin float and Remy tried to get it back, fear seizing his form, "The charge...!"

Erik tossed the coin far away, an explosion followed, for Remy was unable to take the charge back in time.

"Why did'y do tha'?" the angry young mumbled, glaring with his devils eyes towards Erik's impassive ones.

"You survived," Erik stated, "Your family should know, even if you can't go back to them."

Something in Remy gave away the pain he was feeling, fear of loneliness, for he had a home and now was lost. Erik was losing his temper, but the quiver in Remy's eyes reminded him that this mutant was young as he once had been, he was not going to make the right decisions out of the blue, not when he was so lost to understand them, so it was up to Erik to so something.

He arranged a meeting with Jean-Luc LeBeau, bringing his lost son back home – At least for them to see him again, but they couldn't keep him safe.

Remy was a dead man, safe from the enemies of his father's clan, but only if he remained as such. Erik understood Jean-Luc's predicament, as a father, he would be glad to have... to have what he thought lost back. But to always see your youth in danger, unable to live in peace if they remained at your side… it was a painful choice to make.

Erik's offering towards Jean-Luc was from a father to a father, even if Erik himself had surprised himself by even thinking about it, much so by acting upon it.

He wasn't a teacher, he wasn't a guardian, he wasn't a mentor, not like Charles, never like Charles... and yet, he found himself with a young Remy LeBeau to look after, a mutant with so much potential and too many inner turmoil to deal with.

If only Charles could see him now.


End file.
